The Director's Process
"For me, what it means to be a director--and the act of directing--changes with every show. Because each show involves a different combination of collaborating artists, and because each play or musical is different from every other one, every process of theatrical creation is entirely unique." --Kate Chisholm
Kate
Chisholm,
the director of Heartfield, explains, "I come into
each project
with a set of
tools which I have learned over the years through studies, observation
and experience, and a sense of priorities which come from my
reading of the text. What is the style of the piece? What is
my aesthetic response to the text? What are the main stories
being told? What are the most important elements to not lose
sight of when working on a specific project? For example, Ken
Vega clearly intends for the use of Brechtian devices in Heartfield,
so I have to be vigilant about letting the actors get too caught
up in acting the scenes realistically. We explore a scene for
its relationships and emotional truth, but then I have to find
ways to distance the actors from the realism of the scene. Sometimes
this is taken care of in the writing;
other times this is achieved through directorial choices."
"Planning and directing a production is usually a long and highly detailed process. To bring Heartfield to life, some of the key steps I have taken have been:"
Collaborating with the Creative Team
